#this is incoherent and pointless but I wanted To Speak

[marleysfinest]

typing out a little mental health wordvom because sometimes when u don’t take ur tablets for 6 days u get a little ✨spicy✨ and feel compelled to rant so. here I am mentally unloading sorry in advance

being the idiot that I am and having this accidental week off has reminded me why it’s so important to pay attention in the first place. I ignored the state of my mental health for a long time and tried to navigate my chemical imbalance using mindfulness and materialistic self-care alone. needless to say it did not work. do not do this, especially when you know there’s a bigger problem. I was formally diagnosed with anxiety and depression just over a year after I gave birth but should’ve paid attention to it way before that. even then I didn’t start taking it seriously until january ‘23 after a pretty severe breakdown following months of inconsistent medication taking. one thing I started doing - besides being strict and regimented with making sure I take my tablets - was acknowledging my “problem”. realising this is the hand I’ve been dealt and running with it, and actually building life including it rather than building my life around it. I chose to stop letting myself get in my own way and indulged in what makes me genuinely happy. I no longer drink to get drunk (in fact, I hardly drink at all). I’m honest and speak my mind. in acknowledging the fact that I have this imbalance and stopping ignoring it I’ve actually flipped myself around completely.

something that I think separates how I feel about it from the norm is that I do let my anxiety and depression define me. I don’t let it overtake me, and it is not all that I am, but it is part of who I am. denying that and putting it on the back burner has only ever harmed me, and so yes, it defines who I am as a person. I can’t remove it, but I don’t let it win. I don’t know if it’s right, but it works.

the broad conversation surrounding mental health is, I think, changing for the better, but I think we as individuals are obliged to take ownership of this conversation a little more. yes, we can applaud the celebrity that discusses their depression in terms of voluntarily not working for a while and the TV personality that manages their anxiety by cleaning. these are their experiences and they are more than valid. what I think (and this is just my opinion) is that we need to get a little ugly with it. I survive because I take 50mg of sertraline every day. yeah, I get a lot of mental peace from vacuuming my house and practicing mindfulness brings me calm more often than not, but I need antidepressants to live. that’s the long and short of it. I want to see these conversations. I want to know that people rely on antidepressants/anti-anxiety medication to get through the day. I want to know that people go to therapy. I want to know that this isn’t a “problem” we need to be quiet about and chip away at in private.

idk I guess I’m just trying to say I want to have hard conversations about mental health because doing this, even just having those hard conversations with myself, has made me want to be a better person. they have made me a better person, and if this can help even one other person it’s worth it. I luv u take ur medication

[lu-is-not-ok]

This fucking guy.

Anyway have some of my incoherent ramblings about this man under the read more because I have a lot to say about him.

Alright, let me split this into three sections because otherwise this ramble will be even more of a mess than it already is.

I'm gonna discuss Yi Sang in the mirror, or Sang Yi, under a couple of different lights.

One, how he relates to the concept of being the opposite reflection to Yi Sang. Two, how he ties back to Yi Sang's wife from "The Wings". And three, some of my thoughts about how he might fit into the wider scope of the plot and world of Limbus Company.

Strap in lads.

Sang Yi as a "left-handed" reflection

Something that becomes increasingly clear as we're shown interactions between Yi Sang and Sang Yi, and what is directly spelled out by the latter at the end of Canto IV's dungeon, is that Sang Yi is effectively the antithesis of much that makes Yi Sang, well... Yi Sang.

Yi Sang, at the core of everything, is a very sentimental and kind man. He cares a lot about the people around him, even if he doesn't always show it outwardly, and struggles to move on from whatever losses he experiences. Though he may claim otherwise, he's also constantly thinking about everything he's going through, which is what eventually leads him to the Mirror as a form of escapism from his curel reality.

Sang Yi on the other hand... is none of that.

Most of the 'comforting' words or advice Sang Yi offers to Yi Sang can be boiled down to "Stop caring or thinking about every little thing.", a sentiment that's directly in opposition of who Yi Sang is as a person.

Sang Yi finds the idea of feeling joy or despair over the past pointless. He thinks Yi Sang shouldn't feel guilty about his technology being used to exploit others because he already knew what he was getting himself into. He doesn't understand why Yi Sang would have trouble moving on if he were to lose Sang Yi.

Whereas Yi Sang is caring and emotionally-driven, Sang Yi is... I don't want to say uncaring, since he does seem to care about Yi Sang to some degree, but at the very least he is rather distant and logically-driven.

I think the moment that exemplifies that the most is when Yi Sang tells him Gubo doesn't care about him beyond using him as an accessory to prop himself up in the limelight, to which Sang Yi responds that it doesn't matter, that Yi Sang should use this as an opportunity to be in that limelight as well.

And, actually, speaking about that. Sang Yi doesn't really seem to think things through nearly as much as Yi Sang does. Or, at the very least, he doesn't care to look deeper than the surface level.

Sang Yi sees Gubo's attempts at connecting with Yi Sang as genuinely caring about him, whereas Yi Sang is able to see through them and realize Gubo is being entirely selfish here. Sang Yi sees the new League of Nine as something worth joining, while Yi Sang notices that it is nothing but a mockery of the old League. When Sang Yi learns of the new League's plan to destroy mirror worlds, his only reaction is that of mild curiosity without even a sign of concern.

All that being said, the biggest example of this might just be the fact that Sang Yi did not even realize just how badly Yi Sang was feeling until Yi Sang straight up told him there was nothing left for him in this world outside of Sang Yi.

Though we can't know for sure what exactly Sang Yi was feeling at the time, as all that we know about him is colored by Yi Sang's own bias towards him, I think it's fair to say that was the moment where it finally hit Sang Yi just how badly he fucked up by keeping Yi Sang stuck there all to himself.

Which, now that I think about it, transitions nicely to the other angle I want to look at.

Sang Yi as Yeongsim / Yi Sang's wife

First of all, just to lay it out there in the open, as fucking hilarious out of context as it sounds to say Yi Sang was his own wife all along, it's... actually not all that far off.

Beyond the fact that the Mirror is directly named after his wife in "The Wings", there's some other obvious signs that point to it. If you were to take the letters Yi Sang was writing to Sang Yi out of context, you could absolutely mistake them for something one would write to a lover too far away to be easily reachable. Plus, the way Yi Sang's first reaction to seeing Sang Yi is to call him "beautiful" in his mind?

Yeah, there's something to that.

And, of course, there's something to be said about the similarities between Sang Yi's role in Yi Sang's life, and the role Yi Sang's wife played in "The Wings".

That being the way both of them end up isolating Yi Sang, how both of them actively withhold information from him, and how Yi Sang sees them as perfect and without a fault even as they're hurting him.

I don't feel like talking about "The Wings" in depth right now as it's almost 5 am and I want to actually finish writing this fucking post at some point, but if you want to know what I'm comparing Sang Yi to, it's a short read that's easy to find a free pdf online for.

The fact that Sang Yi was trying to keep Yi Sang inside is probably the most spelled out one out of everything I'm talking about in this post. Not only does Sang Yi directly tell Yi Sang to stay with him (mind you he doesn't even ask), but Ishmael, as an outside observer, notes how Sang Yi was trying to keep Yi Sang in the room by making him afraid of the outside.

Actually, looking at when he finally offers Yi Sang the choice to leave, it's in a... very interesting way, shall we say?

Not only does Sang Yi try to make the option of staying sound as appealing as possible by bringing up that Yi Sang will be able to continue doing what he loves (or at least what Sang Yi believes Yi Sang loves), like continue working on the Mirror and keep talking to him.

On the other hand, Sang Yi is reluctant to even bring up the option that Yi Sang can leave, and when Yi Sang shows interest (note that Yi Sang's immediate reaction isn't a "I don't want to leave", it's a "I don't think I can leave"), he continues to make the option sound as unappealing as possible, while still making it clear that it is possible.

How Yi Sang doesn't need to be able to fly to leave, but he will struggle endlessly if he does. How Yi Sang can eventually find somewhere to call his home, but he will have to walk until his feet hurt and will have to settle for wherever or whatever he ends up resting at.

I don't know about you, but that doesn't seem like the kind of encouragement or advice someone who had a person's best interest in mind would make.

Now, let's make some other facts clear while we're at it.

Sang Yi knew that Yi Sang had wings as well, after all, he calls that fact 'obvious' when he finally mentions it. However, he never directly told him he does, even as Yi Sang lamented to him about how (in his eyes) he himself had no wings. He only brings it up when Yi Sang is truly at his lowest.

Sang Yi knew what the effects of supplements Yi Sang was taking were, as he can tell exactly what will happen if Yi Sang stops taking them, or takes several at once. However, he never directly told him this until he gives Yi Sang a choice, even though he was clearly aware they were not beneficial.

Sang Yi knew that Yi Sang's room was always open, as he was confident that Yi Sang would be able to just leave on his own once the effects of the supplements cleared away. However, he never tells Yi Sang that, even when Yi Sang is making it clear he doesn't think he even can leave. It's actually one of the thing Yi Sang ends up finding out by himself.

Despite all of this... Yi Sang never stops to consider that Sang Yi might not have his best interests in mind. Sang Yi is his everything. He's perfect, flawless, the ideal self. He's the only thing Yi Sang has left.

Call me cynical, but it paints the ending of the Canto in a somewhat bittersweet light to me. After all, Sang Yi never has to apologize or even admit to anything, and Yi Sang still views him as positively as he always has.

I guess at the very least it's accurate to the book. After all, Yi Sang in "The Wings" ends up holding on to that perfect image of his wife to the very end.

Sang Yi as an entity

Okay I have no clever transition here like I did last time, but this is probably the thing about Sang Yi that's been bugging me the most.

Have you guys noticed just how much Sang Yi seems to know about Yi Sangs from different worlds? Those sweeping general statements about "All versions of Yi Sang" or "All Yi Sangs" that he makes with full confidence.

When Yi Sang assumes that Sang Yi can "be anywhere he wants" thanks to his wings, just how correct is he?

With the way Sang Yi talks about other Yi Sangs, it gives the impression that he's met a lot of them in the past. In fact, if that's true, it would recolor the meaning of Sang Yi's comment about his meeting with his particular Yi Sang "peculiar".

What's so peculiar about our Yi Sang specifically, if Sang Yi has met so many of them? Is it the method, the fact that it's through the mirror? Is it that Sang Yi finally found a Yi Sang that also had wings? Is it because our Yi Sang is the first one to contact him rather than the other way around?

And while we're on that topic, isn't the way Sang Yi talks about Yi Sangs kind of odd? It's always "All Yi Sangs" or "All versions of Yi Sang", as if he's not part of those Yi Sangs himself. It's like he's putting himself in the role of an outside observer, seperate from the concept of being a 'Yi Sang'.

Just what is Sang Yi, really? He implies he's the version of our Yi Sang that's inside the mirror, the one that "needs to be opposite, yet is quite alike" to the one outside, to explain why our Yi Sang would have wings if he saw them on Sang Yi, but like... He never directly says that's the case.

In fact, when Yi Sang asks Sang Yi about what the outside is like, Sang Yi weirdly dodges the question, saying it's all "the same tiring stuff". Another example of him withholding information aside, this all makes him seem rather fucking suspicious to me.

Just. What is he really?

God I hope we get to see him again, cause I really want to know what the fuck his actual deal is.

[reneesghostinthelivingroom]

OMG! I loves your Rejanis fic, if you ever get the time could you maybe write a part two with a good ending? Feel free to ignore this.

Puppeteers part 2

|| Regina George x Janis Imi'ike

read part 1 here

|| Warnings; swearing, arguments, Regina's drunk, skimmed over drunk hookup, angst, makeup

|| Summary; Regina goes to a party and gets completed wasted, leaving only one person on her mind. So she goes to Janis' house...

Requests open!

Started; october 11th

Finished; october 11th

~~~

It's been a week since the breakup and Regina was out partying with the plastics, though in the back of her mind. All she could think about was Janis. The blonde sighed and chugged back the rest of her drink, which was fifth she's had that night, and put a plan into action. This may just be her intoxicated mind speaking, but she was going to get Janis back. She didn't even think to drive to her house, she walked the whole way there. Stumbling and mumbling incoherent things.

Janis had been staying up late, watching movies and binge eating popcorn. Damian wasn't able to make it since his parents had grounded him, so it was just her. Her parents were out too, having a date night. So you could imagine her surprise when a knock came to the door. She glanced at her clock, in bright glowing green the time showed that it was 1:23am. Another knock followed, sounding much more urgent which made her heart race. Maybe she shouldn't have been watching horror films.

Grabbing the bat she keeps at her bedside, she got out of bed and made her way downstairs. Trying to avoid the creaky steps, though of course one creaked anyways. Which made her pause and hesitate, but not as much as the voice she heard calling for her on the other aide of the door.

"JANIS!! Come on, I know you're home!" Regina yelled, she flinched and gripped the bat tighter. What the fuck was she doing here? At 1:30 in the morning? Janis quickly came to the conclusion that Regina was definitely drunk. Why else would she be there? She noted that her jeep wasn't in the driveway when she checked the window, which meant she must have walked too.

Carefully, Janis opened the door. Bat at the ready on her shoulder." What the hell are you doing here?" She was feeling a mixture of emotions. Though her anger toppled them all.

Regina's eyes locked with hers and without warning, she immediately kissed Janis. Throwing the shorter girl completely off guard." Shut up." Regina muttered against her lips. The bat slipped from Janis' hand and a lot of her anger melted in that moment. Replaced with longing and need. She missed her, more than she cared to admit. But she could smell the alcohol on Regina and that made her grimace. She knew this was wrong.

"Regina... we shouldn't be- you're drunk." Janis tried to reason with the other girl and herself. Though her efforts were pointless as Regina just kissed her again, pushing her up against the wall.

"I said shut up, didn't I? Put your mouth to a better use," Regina said through slurred speech, Janis' mind spun. And maybe some of the alcohol fumes got up into her head, but either way. She caved. This was all she'd wanted all week even if she would have never admitted it. Even if she acted like she completely hated Regina more than she ever had in her life; yeah. Part of her did still hate Regina. But an even deeper part of her loved the girl still. She was almost sure that nothing could change that.

She allowed Regina to kiss her, their lips moving with practiced ease against the other. Janis could feel Regina's nails digging into her hips and it made her groan against the blonde. The vibrations sending shockwaves through Regina. God, she missed this. Maybe that was just the alcohol talking, but she didn't care. In this moment all she wanted was Janis. The rest of the world could fuck itself.

The following morning, Regina found herself in the familiar sheets of Janis' bed. She groaned as she forced herself up, head pounding relentlessly as she reached for her phone. Seeing that she had a bunch of missed calls from Gretchen and a few untranslatable texts from Karen. She rolled her eyes, then looked at Janis. A million thoughts going through her head. Some yelling at herself for doing this, some wishing to do it again, others thinking about how beautiful Janis looked while she slept.

With a heavy sigh, Regina forced herself out of the bed. Stumbling to get her clothes on, she was just about out the door when Janis called her name. Shit. She woke her up.

"Regina?"

Regina looked back at Janis. This was going to make it harder to leave her again; why couldn't she have just stayed asleep? "Janis.."

There was a long silence between the two, each of them seeming to think about what to say. Almost wanting to convince the other to stay, even if they knew it might not end well again. But second chances were a thing, right? Maybe... Regina shook her head," No. I gotta go. This was- a mistake. A stupid fucking drunken mistake."

Janis was out of bed as she watched Regina try to leave, following her down the hall. Not even bothering to throw her clothes back on, knowing it would only waste time.

"Regina, hold on." She grabbed the blonde's wrist. Regina stopped in her tracks, but didn't look at Janis. Knowing if she did she could cave and stay. She couldn't do that. She had to be strong." I know we ended on not so great terms, but last night... you can't deny that there isn't still something there."

"Janis, I was drunk. I like everybody when I'm drunk." She rolled her eyes, trying to be harsh to get the girl to leave her alone. She forced herself to look at the ground, but Janis made Regina look at her. Regina could feel her resolve breaking as her eyes trailed her body.

"I don't want you to go." Janis admitted. Finally saying what both of them had been thinking this whole time. Neither wanted to leave the other again. They relied on each other more than they even realized.

Regina bit her lip, fidgeting with it between her teeth as she glanced at the door. It was so close, she could just leave and try to forget any of this ever happened... but she looked at Janis again. That look in her eyes...

"Fuck you." Regina kissed her again, there was no real hate in her words no matter how hard she tried to make it sound like there was and Janis kissed back. That was enough to get the blonde to consider a second shot. They deserved that much at least, right?

[myrmica]

i'm rewatching the second to last day of wormhole eclipse convo for the one millionth time because i need parts of it transcribed for my blog post and vitalasy straight up asking "Why do we play?" is killing me. you may as well turn towards the camera and stare directly at me. 2k words of this analysis are spent on definitions of play. stop that

(incoherent vitalazam ramble below the cut real stream of consciousness in here. i guess some of this might get rehashed in the thing i'm Supposed to be writing right now but it won't have the same sense of fervor due to the restraints of proper grammar. consider this a bonus...?)

i can't even articulate what i want to say here fucking. fuck my life. the way this conversation is a perfect capstone on eclipse's relationship. zam spends the entire thing acquiescing to whatever vitalasy tells him but not hearing any of it. because he's still mad but he can't express that, and Vitalasy is still mad (Cannot acknowledge zam's anger at him re: exploits without jumping to his own defense. and then he cuts himself off because he knows that's not helping . purely said that on reflex. it reads like a joke.) and vitalasy Still doesn't understand him at all, is still so intensely frustrated by him. and it's just manifesting as vitalasy digging the two of them into this pit while zam does nothing, doesn't fight back even though he reads it as vitalasy trying to kill him to which vitalasy says "i'm not trying to kill you!" even though moments later vitalasy will offer to ban zam, has been urging him to do it this whole time. because not only is killing zam in this moment made trivial and pointless by the exploits but even if it were possible and it could mean something it Wouldn't mean anything because it wouldn't change anything; banning is synonymous with leaving and despite how relentlessly zam toys with the idea he will never. ever. Ever. actually do it.

he's miserable but he can't put himself before the server the way vitalasy thinks would be best for him and for everyone else because as far as zam is concerned his health and the health of the server are one and the same. he's playing out the exploits and sticking with spoke because it's like, it's almost saying "if you won't see it through I will" to a vitalasy who has in his own words discarded first the exploits and then the server itself. BUT AGAIN: HE CAN'T EXPRESS THIS! HE APOLOGIZED TO VITALASY! it would be wrong to go back on that but the apology was as much of a lie as his relationship with vitalasy always was when they were on good terms.

i mean look at this you can literally watch him course correct over and over again as he remembers what vitalasy wants from him. it never ends. i want to squeeze him until he dies. it's exponentially easier to place the blame on himself but doing that has always just freaked vitalasy out he hates when zam does that so bad. it's the easy way out of dealing with a problem to punish yourself for it.

LIKE OKAY ... what does he want? does he want vi and subz to just fight him? would that be easier? that's always been the expected response that's the counter to the move zam has made on the board. i betray you; you attack me; differences are settled in combat. he talks about fighting at one point like winning and losing have ingrained moral qualities. if someone thinks you're wrong, and tries to stop you, and you beat them, it proves that you're right. but he tried to go against the exploits and vitalasy wouldn't fight him, vitalasy stepped out of bounds entirely and said "i'm not playing anymore, i don't like this game!" after fucking the game over for everybody else, and he never forgave that. and now, vitalasy hates what zam is doing but he's not trying to fight it, he's trying to force zam to do what he did, to stop playing by his own rules. to look outside of bounds. to consider a bigger picture. he is notoriously bad at that.

he likes mapicc so much because they speak the same language. you know how mapicc is able to temporarily settle their differences before the pangi duel and subsequent extremely obvious betrayal by handing a "win" to zam and it Works? it works really well? whatever. whatever

[whumpafterdark]

clementine: chapter one

tws: EXPLICIT noncon, intimate whumper, implied stalking, implied torture of another character, just general creepiness

clementine had no idea where he was.

the last thing he remembered was going with his best friend maddie to a bar... then after that, nothing. and now, his hands were shackled to the wall above his head, giving him just barely enough room to sit. panic spiked inside of him.

"maddie? hello? where are you?" he called out frantically, but received no answer.

the door swung open, and a small part of him was hoping that it was maddie here to rescue him, but it wasn't. instead, he was met with a tall, fair skinned man with white hair in a ponytail and one eye covered by an eyepatch. despite his scary appearance, he had a soft smile on his face.

"hello, dear. my name is tanner. and who might you be?" he said, his voice honey sweet.

"i-" clementine struggled to speak, fear rising in him. tanner knelt down in front of him and cupped his face in his hands, an adoring expression on his face.

"you're so cute. it's okay clemmie, i already know your name. i've been watching you for a while. and now we finally get to meet!"

clementine sobbed with fear, trying to squirm out of his grasp. tanner wiped the tears off of his face gently before leaning in and kissing him, not stopping until clem was breathless.

"pplease let mme go..." he whimpered meekly.

"sshh. soon, you'll never want to be anywhere else." tanner promised as his hands moved from clementine's face, lower, caressing his chest, then his abdomen... clementine suddenly realized what was happening, all too late as tanner began to take off the younger man's pants.

"nno! wait, don't, PLEASE!" he begged, kicking his legs out in a feeble attempt to hit the man.

"you're adorable, clemmie. sshhhh. just hold on, it'll hurt at first- i know you're a virgin- but then i promise it'll feel so good." tanner smiled at him tenderly as he pulled off clementine's pants, taking his underwear with them.

"nnno, nno! sstop! HELP! ANYONE- PLEASE!" clem screamed out, thrashing around to try to escape what he knew was going to happen.

"you know it's pointless, baby. just relax, try to enjoy it." tanner whispered to him as he stroked down clem's length with one hand, unbuckling his belt and sliding his own pants off with the other.

clemmie was scared beyond words at this point, blubbering incoherently as he wiggled around like a fish out of water. tanner was kneeling on top of his legs, which pinned them down firmly and spread them apart.

the young man screamed in pain as tanner forced himself inside of him without warning, tears filling up his dark eyes.

"i'm sorry baby, i just can't help myself, you're so pretty when you cry." he said as he thrusted inside him, spreading him further than he even knew was possible.

another scream was wrenched from him, one of desperation and pain, but then he quieted to scared whimpers. clementine was unable to turn his head fast enough to avoid tanner's lips meeting his and forcing his mouth open, kissing him again while he felt like he was being torn apart.

when he finally broke away, clementine cried out with pain again from tanner's roughness, tears flowing freely down his cheeks.

"you know, you should be grateful to me. i'm going easy on you. your friend wasn't so lucky."

the words felt like ice in his veins.

"wwwhat ddid you ddo to mmaddie?!" he gasped out in between broken sobs.

"oh, nothing much... yet. she's not my type, don't worry about that. she's much funner when she's short a few fingernails."

his eyes stretched open wide with horror, and then he screamed again as tanner began to thrust harder, a look of pleasure on the older man's face.

clementine's mind felt like it was filling up with fog, as it became harder and harder for him to focus. he whimpered, then fell silent as he dissociated to the point where he couldn't feel the pain as much anymore.

the next thing he remembered was tanner gently, carefully putting his clothes back on him, ignoring the blood trickling down his leg, caressing his face once more and then standing up and leaving him there alone.

his head drooped to the side. this was all too much, too much, and he felt his consciousness waning before he passed out.

[cheerful-sixears]

Running To Your Heart When You're Thinking Of…

STATUS: Unfinished; will most likely remain unfinished. [why? because it was started at a horrid time of my life. plain and simple.]

FANDOM: Transformers: Bayverse

PROMPT: “I pushed everyone away because they weren’t you”

SONG INSPIRATION: Sleep Token-Aqua Regia 

PAIRING: Ironhide (Bayverse) x OC (Self Insert)

After a long, strenuous drive through the city, riddled with anxiety and emotional struggles, Killian arrogantly thrusted the vehicles’ passenger door open and whimpered in a very stressed, overwhelmed manner. He said nothing as he walked over to the old, roughed-up barn on the abandoned property that he, strangely though in Keely-fashion, claimed as a “safe space”. It was an unusual choice, but it held strong feelings of safety to him, and that’s what mattered in the end. The vehicle behind him began to shapeshift-rather-transform and knelt down behind him, placing his brutish arm around Killian’s person as a barrier to keep him from moving any further away. Keely grumbled  and stomped his foot, his muscles tensed and braced with clenched fists. He turned around with an almost irate, yet pleading expression, “Just let me go, please? It’s not like you wanted to stay here, anyway,” 

The mech snorted with an irritable whirring rumble, almost offended by the young man’s words. Ironhide, his assigned guardian, stood upright for a moment, leaned down further to Keely’s

 level and held back an annoyed, rumbling growl-at least attempted to-but in the end it seemed to have slipped, “I do not understand, why are you so angry at me? Why do you push everyone away and expect me to make it better? I am your guardian, not your-” Before he could finish his heated retort, Killian stomped his foot again, and bared his teeth in what looked like….agony. Sheer agony. The emotional pain that Ironhide began reading brought a sudden ache to his own spark.

“I pushed everyone away because they weren’t you.--Optimus? Ratchet? Bumblebee? I don’t want them. I want YOU. I have this aching in my chest….it’s not physical pain…it’s this…weird, sickening feeling that i get everytime you’re around. I just want to be with you….You ever get that sensation? Where someone is literally your life because you only live to see them smile? Laugh? Maybe even cry?....You’re that person, Ironhide. You’re MY person….” At this point, Killian was sputtering and sobbing. He was near incoherent at the end of his desperate point made. Gasping, tearful and shamefully covering his face with visibly shaken hands, his anguish and anger spilled from his trembling lips in bursts of sorrowful whimpers and gasps.

Taken aback, Ironhide swallowed hard. His chords were strained as he attempted to form his next words with caution. He was lucky his previous sentence was cut short. He knew then, from experience, his words would’ve caused more damage than good. He was an expert in combat and weapon’s specialist, but a spark-mate? He never thought twice about that…with a human. It never once crossed his mind, until he thought about Killian’s words. His optics traced Keely for further emotional analysis, but he wasn’t Ratchet, so that was pretty pointless. Empathy was not his specialty, neither was human emotion, but something nagged him in the back of his processors. It was a desperate voice within the workings of his spark. It yearned for him to speak, to catch the young man before he fell. It desperately spoke the obvious phrase, “save him.”

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Paul AUSTER (1947- april 2024)

Zijn grootvader kwam uit Oekraïne. Gebruikte nooit een computer. -

"The New York Trilogy"

We exist for ourselves, perhaps, and at times we even have a glimmer of who we are, but in the end we can never be sure, and as our lives go on, we become more and more opaque to ourselves, more and more aware of our own incoherence. No one can cross the boundary into another – for the simple reason that no one can gain access to himself.

…..

In general, lives seem to veer abruptly from one thing to another, to jostle and bump, to squirm. A person heads in one direction, turns sharply in mid-course, stalls, drifts, starts up again. Nothing is ever known, and inevitably we come to a place quite different from the one we set out for.

…..

Then, without any warning, we both straightened up, turned towards each other, and began to kiss. After that, it is difficult for me to speak of what happened. Such things have little to do with words, so little, in fact, that it seems almost pointless to try to express them. If anything, I would say that we were falling into each other, that we were falling so fast and so far that nothing could catch us.

…..

We all want to be told stories, and we listen to them in the same way we did when we were young. We imagine the real story inside the words, and to do this we substitute ourselves for the person in the story, pretending that we can understand him because we understand ourselves. This is a deception. We exist for ourselves, perhaps, and at times we even have a glimmer of who we are, but in the end we can never be sure, and as our lives go on, we become more and more opaque to ourselves, more and more aware of our own incoherence. No one can cross the boundary into another—for the simple reason that no one can gain access to himself.”

…..

[loveislandthegame]

thoughts on today’s volume!

i kissed claudia, and i kissed her again in the diamond scene (she also convinces the guys to give you first place, which is kinda pointless if you want her or theo, but whatever) theo, you got a big storm coming 💅🏽

of course i’m grafting on jin too, since you can only pick him/jack/oakley at the recoupling (he got jealous that i chose claudia as my extra kiss , whoops)

i didn’t even want to comment on luna’s grand gesture because the whole thing just gave me second hand embarrassment . she pulled some prank...where she threw oakley’s clothes out ? i guess ? the islanders were too stunned to speak

speaking of clothes, jin’s casual fit is so UGLY 😭 i get that there's only so much you can do with masculine clothing , but sir , you are a model ...an underwear model, but a model nonetheless. oakley’s outfit looks fantastic though . i’m glad they finally did him right

more expository diamond scenes (FB, stop paywalling your incoherent backstories...) summary for the broke girlies: when OG Girl Rachel got dumped, she went off on the girlies . none of their couples are secure ! in fact, she kissed one of the guys ! she didn’t reveal who though lmao

i definitely think rachel kissed theo, that’s why he’s being annoying af overcompensating, with the whole “if MC picks me i’ll leave the villa with you 😩” shenanigans before the recoupling…isn't he supposed to be a player? regardless, i wish this was a game with actual branching, because i have not shown one singular crumb of interest in this man

picked jin, i was nice to luna the whole time, everything was good…until jack and sophie did a “s6 pied off roberto/og LI” level of 180 . Like what ??? 😭 i was just gonna ignore them , especially since the other islanders actually defended us for once (s7 cast could never) but i paid for the diamond scene, why not. sophie ended up apologising , blah blah blah. i just hope the aggy couple doesn’t continue to harass us

[pocketbelt]

Girls' Frontline: Slow Shock (iOS)

This is a long one so you probably want to click into the post so the Keep Reading break works properly.

GFL has had, among its circle, infamously wordy events before but this is probably the most direly it's ever needed an editor.

There are plenty of scenes and portions that could be flatly cut and not a thing would change or be lost, from pointless cutscenes where two villains speak euphemistically about something that never pays off to extensive, highly repetitious descriptions of cyber-zombie corpse and experiment destruction that do nothing but pad the run-time and the 'node count' (each 'node' on the event's level select is a cutscene or level) of the event to keep it in the 70-90 range major events usually have. And even then it needs a bunch of post-story minor detail cutscenes with a Sangvis Ferri squad to actually hit that.

And it still manages to leave out or skip over events for 'twists' and an in medias res start that just make parts of it incoherent or nonsensical. Pray tell, how did the other factions (Statesec and KCCO/Military) get spy devices into the beating heart of this super-populated cyber-zombie tower's control and spying platform in the heart of the ultra-bioradiation zone before we got there? Has everyone just always had their shit figured out and just been pretending this whole time to fuck with us?

The story itself is the first time since Polarised Light (TWO YEARS AGO) that your military commander character actually does some military command and carries out an actual campaign/assault on an enemy structure, and while I would like to enjoy it it just overly highlights how you've been doing either fucking nothing or the most incompetent operation executions possible in the last three events. Also, high-ranking enemies who were pretty impervious to bullets and standard attacks are suddenly, inexplicably quite pervious; Narciss two events or so ago needed to be literally Deus Ex Machina'd by Lunasia to save everyone because she was invincibly fast and powerful and now she gets triple-teamed by a Sangvis squad who don't event get hit, they just floss on her and shoot her while she's down and walk off. Nothing materially has changed in the Griffin camp's weapons (unless, inexplicably, we somehow canonically did not have the Sangvis bosses from Destroyer onward until right now) but even the normal T-Dolls can actually hurt the various super-Nytos they just couldn't before.

I realise this might sound stupid, given my prevailing complaint about GFL's story has been the inexplicable invincibility and random magic powers Paradeus has had for four major events or so now, but in just taking it away for no adequately explored reason you just highlight the fucking absurdity of it before now. It's not even completely gone; they somehow get a cyber-zombie girl with pure white armour and a cloak and a giant gleaming white scythe into a standard hospital in a populated area with a cyborg clone of a doctor in tow to kill and replace one. That scene is to show that they're going to do something evil to Kalina, your adjutant, while you're away but all drama around her well-being is out the window because we know from GFL2 pre-release trailers that she's perfectly fine.

It's a mess, it's just a mess. It isn't plotted well, it's padded to hell, there's just weird gaps all over and it spends too much time masturbating over trying to be spooky and sad by going over and over how the regular Nytos are poor little girls abducted into the cyber-zombie nightmare, but also they've been doing and saying that shit for multiple major events now and it's no longer shocking or spooky or worth reading. Nothing new is done with it.

I follow GFL1's main plot basically out of inertia, now, and because when the main recurring cast interact they are charming (the dynamics of Team 404, DEFY, the AR Team and Dandelion are all still great). Last event, Longtudinal Strain, was said to be the first event of "GFL1's final arc" when it was announced for CN however long ago, and miraculously the EN server is now up-to-date and level with CN for story content.

It feels pretty clear that they intend to have everyone hit the ending as close to simultaneously as possible, which is good, but GFL2 is in the "soft-release" open beta state if not officially released in China now, as of last week. With that in mind, and some of the issues here, I start to wonder if GFL1 isn't simply in a hasty wrap-up phase, given this event sticks even things as momentous as DEFY finally capturing the elusive William into a post-story node with no real fanfare (and spent the entire event building up Martha Meitner as the real brains behind all things Paradeus).

There is more underneath the cut below, but in short, man, GFL1 went off the rails after Polarised Light. Eclipse & Saros stands out as a high point post-PL, and Longtudinal Strain had some cool parts, but yeah I'm basically ready for this to tie its stupid plot off and get to those character-focus stories and mini-events they discussed doing (since they can't advance main plot much past a specific point now that GFL2 is out there and real).

On the off-chance you know, feel free to explain/answer any of the things I'm going to mention here, I'll cop to being wrong; but, if your answer/explanation is "well in this side material broadly not released to anyone outside China" maybe don't bother. If your story needs supplemental material to just stand up and work at all your story's fucked and you need to go back and redo it (starting with putting all that shit into the actual story).

So here's one; when RO frees Ange in Slow Shock, she pops a glorified fitbit on her wrist that tracks her vitals and reports to Persica about her status. This happens at a very specific point in time; the assault teams creeping up the Paradeus tower base are made aware of the fitbit's activation and know then that RO has succeeded (and are able to tell when RO has received their comms or not besides). After this, they are locked in combat with the super-Nyto procession, fighting Grig, wounding Bramedb, getting into various computer rooms, dealing with the Evangel Axis and freeing Aliana from its grip and so on and so on. Also, at a very specific point in time, given as 10 minutes from when the Commander issues an order to an aerial-support controlling T-Doll, bombers will take off to come and annihilate the towers and wipe out the Paradeus base.

In and around all this, AN-94 and AK-15 manage to ace their way up the tower, find SOP-II and nudge her toward RO, then find and abduct William and exfiltrate completely undetected by anyone, and the Sangvis Ferri assault squads bring the rear looting the tower and recording video of its technologies for analysis and such. Toward the end of the assault, Ange's vitals are reported as flatlining, RO runs and checks, and Ange is just gone.

So, what the fuck was RO doing that entire time? Between rescuing Ange and finding SOP-II/being told of Ange removing the fitbit and fleeing (presumably being swept along by DEFY because the Nyto possessed by AK-12 also just vanishes), she seemed to just space out, just went into a corner to disassociate for the entire rest of the event until that moment. Ange was barely alive and needed extensive medical equipment to keep her body ticking over, why did RO just leave her and wander off? Where did that entire time span go? RO explicitly did not join the fight or have to hold off a Nyto or anything else!

To talk of padding, the first chapter is rife with it; it's focused on Ange and her memories, of when she was a child, then when she joined the Military, then Griffin and then finally a hilariously false faking of the manor fight against Grey from previous event Mirror Stage (I think it was MS). The idea is Martha and presumably RPK-16 are doing Nyto-surgery on Ange and fucking with her memories to see if she would ever change her actions or decisions, and she doesn't, and also casts 'mystery' over what actually happened in her past.

Why have the faked Mirror Stage sequence at all? Ange's actions didn't matter there because Nyto-Grey and the Paradeus forces invincibly beat everyone and walked through everything that might've stopped them, teleporting soldiers in from nowhere and shrugging off anything they got hit with. It seems like it might be a brainwashing thing because it changes the Paradeus win to a hilarious loss and makes Statesec go evil to kill Ange, but the post-sequence scene is the exact same "she makes the same choices every time" spiel and also clearly ends with the entire sequence breaking down and not working. What does it achieve? Nothing, really, except to remind you of an embarrassingly bad sequence and prove that the protagonists only get to achieve things or be cool in literal dream sequences/fake realities.

The other sequences there are also too long for what they want to convey (introducing Martha and Sana, revealing Martha to be former Relics Agency and also the true origin of Paradeus, giving Ange's motivation for being hellbent on fighting Paradeus because it hilariously has not come up until now) but they at least have things they're doing that obviously matter for the plot. That fourth sequence doesn't.

On that note, the entire handling of Martha in isolation is fine, but in the context of the wider plot it's fucking stupid. Martha made the base tech underpinning Nytos, she has always had a callous disregard for ethics and human experimentation, she was doing it all along to try and resurrect her daughter Sana who died in a terrorist attack during World War III. Okay.

So why is she only coming up now? Why did they just graft the motivation for William, to this point explicitly said and shown to be the origin of Paradeus and beating heart of it all, onto her as well? Because William has clearly been chasing the means of resurrecting his sister Lunasia (who also died in a terror attack!), so why introduce this other character to co-opt and do all of it too and be the actual origin of all the cyber-zombie collective consciousness shit? What did William bring to any of this, then? The cult stuff that doesn't seem to matter? His dad's money?

Like I don't think that's a "well wait and see where the story goes next" thing; why is Martha here at all? She hasn't been mentioned to this point or mattered and this is, by the devs' own proclamation, the final arc of the story. A lot of what Martha is here for is to explain why Ange has been running herself into her grave doggedly hunting Paradeus, because without a deeply personal angle her antics are just insane after a point, but why couldn't you just make that William? Why introduce a whole other character to do all this instead of just...using William, the mystery man we've been pursuing since Continuum Turbulence three years ago (five years if you're on CN). If you want to be truly surreal, have Martha be William and go nuts with it, some alchemical rebus shit giving it's all about pursuing immortality and resurrection in insane and obviously stupid ways.

I'll specifically call myself out if that happens in the next event but I'm pretty confident it won't.

Last thing and this is minor by itself, but in the post-story bits with the Sangvis squad sweeping the tower to look at the weird shit around the place, they find a series of projection rooms that are set up to display recordings of key events in Martha's life, such as when she got fired from the Relics Agency or met Von Oberstein in Germany and so on. And like, why? I guess they could be set up for her to reminisce about, but they're unlocked, unprotected and are set to instantly delete themselves if they detect an unauthorised person enter...which would, presumably, be everyone in rank below the unique super/boss Nytos, right? The regular ones get nothing out of it and are often kept from seeing key files or knowing anything about the Paradeus leaders.

Like it's for us, the player, even if the sequences are so fucking short as to tell us nothing that we didn't already know or couldn't just infer (or show us Paradeus Magic happening again with a recreation of Paradeus killing a press cluster and a politician on an airfield to replace him with a cyborg clone, somehow no-one saw that, just more fucking cyber-zombie magic), but why not just have them be video files sucked out of a damaged mainframe like the other scenes shown? It's just weird, is all, like why would they build these and put them there?

You might ask "why question it if you know it's mainly for your benefit" and sure, I grant you that, but GFL for a good lot of its run was actually pretty grounded despite the anime girl Terminators core concept. Their guns were real guns with real limitations and capabilities, the Dolls with anti-materiel/anti-tank rifles didn't show up for a while so tanks were super threats back at the time of Singularity/Continuum Turbulence; even the fictional tech was pretty grounded stuff, the T-Dolls have real constraints like battery and wireless comms issues and being hacked and ammo is a constant concern, their rules are pretty straightforward and all. This made the Neural Upgrade/MOD process especially cool because in-universe it was technology advancing, the addition of HOCs and Sangvis Capture and son were grounded advancements and cool because of that.

It's why the KCCO and early Paradeus were effective villains; they had similarly realistic/grounded constraints they had to work around, even the special Paradeus forcefields had limitations (couldn't block heavy ordinance, for example) that made sense even if the tech was unknowable cyber-future-esque stuff. It's why later Paradeus fall off, because they start being able to silently mass-evacuate dense residential zones to teleport their pure white soldiers and mechs and hyper-destructive tentacle-and-robe cyber women into places and no-one notices or sees. There's a little tidbit in Slow Shock revealing the news broadcaster Shadowless is actually on the Paradeus payroll but she's one lady and there's no way they can black-out an entire residential block complaining on social media (which does, explicitly, exist, T-Dolls even use it too) about the cops shuffling them all out for a few hours (and this happens multiple times!), especially when some have to come back to destroyed apartments and so on. That requires explanations and money to smooth over/cover repairs, which makes trails somewhere, and if the world is so grounded then this is the stuff the spy agencies would be finding and the Paradeus conspiracy wouldn't be as secretive as it has been.

But they don't because Paradeus are Magic and don't have any limits or concerns or operational and logistical constraints until the plot needs them to. And stuff like the Plot Projection Rooms just glare in the same way; they don't make sense for the style and tone GFL set for itself, and it doesn't offer any explanation for why Martha has three whole unlocked and unsecured rooms dedicated to projecting 3D recordings of key points of her life that are rigged to self-destruct if someone with a low-ranked or no ID badge walks in.

Yeah, it's a minor thing, it doesn't matter for shit ultimately, it just annoys me, you know? This is just the best way to explain what my brain damage is, is all.

[earlgraytay]

that being said, hoo boy.... I am basically the target audience for this story, inasmuch as it has one.

I am a big fandom nerd, and I have been in my share of incredibly dramatic and borderline culty fandoms. I read Life Among The Lorrums Glowfic and HPMOR and a lot of ratfic, though I never got too far into it. I was a Homestuck and found some uh. Very very culty and nasty friends because of it. Mostly managed to get away from them because I started calling them on their bullshit.

I was rat-adjacent at the time that @nostalgebraist was writing TNC. I like rationalists; I do not like cults, and enough things about Tumblr Rationalism (TM) pinged my cult spidey sense, rightly or wrongly, that I wanted to stay away. And uh.... I have not read much of his supplemental material, so I might be wildly off the mark here, but... TNC (the our-world work of fiction) feels like both a love letter and a rebuke to the Rationalist Movement circa 2014-2015.

It's a love letter, in the sense that the Spelunkers are Our People, and they're portrayed with the love and tenderness and humanity they deserve. The only reason any of the Spelunkers are getting fucked up by this particular infohazard is because they're good and moral people (regardless of the occasonal Forum Assholery) and they want to do the Right Thing.

It's a rebuke, in the sense that ... well, it's a story about a bunch of rationalists-in-all-but-name forming a cult that is entirely fueled by moral scrupulosity and stimulants. Around the time this was getting written, I said something along the lines of "I don't think rationalism is a cult, but that's entirely because if you tell a bunch of rationalists to jump, they will start arguing over whether it's a waste of shoe leather to jump, and whether it's ethical to wear shoes at all, and they will never ever jump because they're too busy arguing. If y'all were any more prone to groupthink, I'd be scared for you."

This is one of the Worst Possible Endgames for 2015-era Tumblr Rationalism as a movement-- forming a cult around moral scrupulosity and the increasingly-incoherent writings of a madman/visionary. And while I don't know if that was an intentional part of the writing of TNC, it really really speaks to me, because I Was (Sort Of) There. I was scared of this happening. And seeing it happening on the page is both horrifying and cathartic.

I am also a writer of children's fiction. I have known, from a pretty young age, that I have a Grand And Terrible Purpose, and that writing fiction is a facet of that Purpose. I'm here to tell stories. Whether or not anyone else wants to hear them, that's what I am in this world to do. And I write for children mostly because ... I can put things in kidlit that adults would reject. Messy trans kids. Traumatized protagonists who don't have the power to easily escape. Autistic folks who act autistic. Otherkin and multiple systems. Weird People who are Weird in ways that aren't necessarily pleasant, that adults have preconceptions about and children don't.

At the same time, I... have had to almost entirely reject the idea that Morality Is The Thing You Should Aspire To Over All Else, because if I do not, scrupulosity will eat me alive. I like the Wiccan Rede a lot ("if it harm none, do what ye will"). And even under the Rede, I think it's inevitable that you're going to harm people at some point. We live in a society that's set up to harm everyone, even the privileged and the powerful who are supposed to benefit from it. And we live in a natural world that doesn't particularly care if you survive, much less if you're happy.

Harm's inevitable. The thing you need to do is follow what makes you happy, first and foremost, and try to minimize the harm that you do along the way. Don't engage in pointless sadism, but don't deprive yourself of things because you don't want to be a burden. Don't actively set out to start shit, but don't take shit in the name of keeping the peace. Things like that.

....and so TNC is really interesting because... in another life, if I hadn't had some of the experiences I've had, I could have been Selby. The thought's terrifying.

Okay, time to go back into the Caves while I eat breakfast.

....I'm having mixed feelings about continuing, for one reason and one reason only: I have a very low tolerance for cult shit, even in fiction

Like, "Have not been able to pick up The Locked Tomb, even though I know I would adore it in every respect, because I know that it's fundamentally about The Realities Of Living In A Death Cult" low tolerance

and as of Chapter 18/Materials VIII, it is blatantly telegraphed, with sirens and a fucking can-can line, that that is where TNC is going

[eldritch-spouse]

Breg's s/o squirts for the first time for him

please he would be so surprised

[Ohh Hell yeahh nice.]

Breg's s/o squirts for him

(Minors dni)

TW: Heat? (I dunno); breederism.

In retrospect, it would be weird if you hadn't squirted.

Somewhat suspicious of Breg's motives, as you naturally tend to be knowing all the things he's done in the past, you brushed his mentions of a heat cycle aside carelessly.

Heat… Yeah right, he's already so hormonal, the difference would probably be minimal! You thought, like a complete idiot. After all, if you can handle his normal sexual drive and Breg knows when to stop, then you'll breeze through it.

Yeah no.

It hit him so suddenly... Physically speaking, Breg remained vastly the same, save for his skin now being almost always fully black. You had erroneously assumed the monster stumbling through your apartment was the same bashful dork you recently began living with, just quieter and somehow sweatier. Little did you know, most of Breg's self-restraint had already been canned by that point. He was hanging on by a very thin thread.

Perhaps, if you had bothered to take him seriously, to really listen to all the details Breg explicitly laid out, for your sake- You wouldn't be in such a dire situation. You would have known better than to enter your shared bedroom while the breeder was in the instinctive process of making a nest. You wouldn't have touched the pillows, blankets and clothes messily clumped on the mattress.

By the time you heard snarling and thunderous footsteps, Breg had already literally pounced on top of you in some sort of territorial stupor. In that horrifying moment, you managed to miraculously recall one thing- Breg had told you to move very slowly in case he did get agitated. That he will halt sexual behavior if lay belly up and bare your neck to him. More than a little humiliating, but you know Breg would never lie about something that dangerous. Unfortunately, selective reckless curiosity is your biggest sin, it lead you to Breg's room, and it made you want to go along with whatever the randy monster had in mind at that moment.

Bad idea.

Turns out that, when Breg is not giving you thorough tongue-baths, insisting you eat whatever he tosses inside the bedroom or literally roaring at you to stay vaguely within the nest's perimeter- He's spending all his energy into fucking your pretty little brains out. The thing here is, perhaps if he could smell conception within you, something you remember Breg said his kind can scent, he would have stopped trying to incessantly breed you a couple of hours ago. However, since basic biology denies that from taking place, Breg is in a perpetually frustrated loop of wanting to impregnate you, with no success, ragged screaming and a whole lot of fluids. The male is clearly helplessly confused.

In spite of being most definitely cumbrained as of now, in fact, he's so incoherent you can barely get a sentence out of him- Breg is somehow mentally there enough to make some manner of mental gymnastics. The big eureka moment sparked, and the breeder figured out he's just not positioning you right. You could practically see the lightbulb above his head when he tilted your hips up, so that it'll help take. Which leads to your current situation. 

Lower half folded, knees at either side of your head, eyes rolled back as you claw at the monster's back and attempt to form words. What is language anymore? You've stopped understanding letters after the fifth orgasm. Everything is sore and your poor pussy has not stopped spasming around Breg's engorged cock- The ridges, God those fucking ridges! He tried stuffing both in at some point and begrudgingly gave up when you threatened to hit him with a shoe. Your self-proclaimed mate is nothing but a moaning mess of sweaty, shaky limbs as he pistons tirelessly towards another pointless climax that'll achieve nothing except pushing out all the other hot loads he's already buried into your overflowing womb. You're not sure what you're coated in anymore- Sweat? Drool? Cum? Tears of overstimulation? Just don't think about it. There's a bump in your lower abdomen and you refuse to look at it.

" Breg- " He needs to stop. For both your sakes. A monster can only ejaculate so many times until he dies from excessive coitus and you know for a fact both of you are extremely dehydrated. Alas, all the sound of his name in your worn voice seems to do is spur the breeder to roll his hips harder into you, whining what might be a shard of your own name in return.

" Y'need to slow do- OH Guhh- "

And here you were, thinking there wasn't any spot left in your poor insides this pervert hadn't touched yet. Whatever he's managed to spear now is forcing downright bestial noises out of you. You'd sooner die than ever admit said sounds are coming from you. Though, at the rate your massacred cunt is clenching down on Breg, he's not making any less disgusting vocalizations.

" Hhn- Breg! "

You're barreling towards another orgasm, but instead of it being dimmer in intensity, it heightens. You didn't even know that was possible. You also never thought you'd be squirting all over Breg's improvised nest-mattress. But there is no other explanation for the rush of wetness and mind-melting pleasure coursing through you right now. What a time to discover new and embarrassing bodily functions of yours…

Apparently, the sensation of sudden liquid coating Breg's legs and splattering everywhere obscenely due to his continued movement eventually registers in the monster's rut-fried neurons and he comes to a trembling halt. The look on his face while he peels back to examine you is a curious cocktail of confusion, curiosity, mild worry and arousal. Breg garbles something incomprehensible at you. You don't speak in demon tongues unfortunately.

" S-Sorry? " What else are you supposed to say after you soak your currently half-feral monster boyfriend in girl-cum?

Breg pulls out, still throbbing with pent up frustration, examining gratuitous globs of pearly jizz ooze out of you with stern disapproval (as if you could somehow keep it all in) before dipping to have a taste of what's sticking to your inner thighs. What if he thinks you're like.. . Incontinent?

" Agh-... Ahn- " 

That's his most recent attempt at English today, mayhaps his most successful one so far. His face scrunches with visible mental effort.

" Aghhain? "

Are you fucking serious right now?

You know what? This makes sense. Why are you surprised? Of course Breg would be into this. Of course he'd use his one coherent brainfart to goad you into squirting for him again. Fuck it, what else do you have to lose? Certainly not all the fancy jackets and brand new sheets your needy "mate" made you ruin.

You decide to make a deal, putting it in the simplest terms possible to avoid any miscommunication. " Yes. But- Water. After. "

Breg trills, literally, nodding enthusiastically. Success.

Less than a moment later, your numb jelly legs are planted on the nest. Breg's digits feverishly flicking your abused clitoris while his drooling tongue plunges into your brimming pussy to quickly locate the very same spot, hammering at it. You needn't glance down to know his free hand is busy working at himself. You have a small feeling this "feature" of yours will be sought after well outside of Breg's heats.

[leedosbunnyboy]

Jaehyun; Lunch Break

Genre: Angst, Smut

Pairing: Jaehyun x M!Reader

Requested: no

Warning(s): mentions of homophobia, handjobs, fingering, degradation, rim job, eating out, cum eating, semi-public sex, mentions of exhibitionism, implied penetrative sex

Summary: On your dad's birthday, he decides to have a family dinner. Little do you know, he chose the restaurant your boyfriend works at.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Hide everyone!" My oldest brother yelled as he saw our dad return from work.

All six of us hid behind couches, doors, and tables as we awaited Dad walking through the door.

Thick, heavy footsteps stopped outside the door as the knob began to turn with a small squeak.

"SURPRISE!" We all yelled as dad smiled.

"Thank you kids." He said and invited all of us into a hug.

"Don't forget me!" Mom complained as she pecked him on the cheek.

We each took our turns handing him out gifts as he took his time appreciating each one.

As we cleaned up the mess of discarded present wrappers and neglected price tags, the topic of dinner was brought up by our youngest sister.

"I'm hungry!" Whined Naeun as she plopped on the floor.

"Speaking of it, I am too." My youngest brother, Minhyeon, said.

"I could go for dinner." My oldest brother, Juyeon, chimed in.

Thus started the arguing of which restaurant to go to as your parents rolled their eyes at our pointless fighting.

"QUIET!" Bellowed our mother.

"It's your dad's birthday, so he gets to choose where we eat." She said and looked up to our dad.

We stood around as we awaited our dad's final verdict.

"Alright! I've decided." He said and stood up.

"Where are we going?" My older sister, Songyee, asked.

"That's a surprise." He said and grabbed his keys.

I knew dad would say something along those lines, considering he never gives a straight answer. We all hopped into the car and waited to see which restaurant dad chose as our destination.

Along the way I decided to text my boyfriend, Jaehyun, out of boredom.

Me:

Jae :(

Jaehyun<3:

Yes baby?

Me:

I'm bored and wanna talk

Jaehyun<3:

Why are you bored?

Me:

It's my dad's birthday, and he's taking us to some 'mystery' restaurant to celebrate.

Jaehyun<3:

Well I'd love to keep my babyboy company, but I've got to get back to work.

Me:

:,(

Jaehyun<3:

I'll be on lunch break soon, then we can talk. Okay babe?

Me:

Yeah, talk to you later. I love you.

Jaehyun<3:

I love you too<3

"We're here!" Dad yelled out as he parked the car.

We each hopped out and entered the restaurant.

It was on the fancier side with many intricate designs on the walls and decor.

We waited to be seated as the place seemed to be packed.

"I'm so sorry about the wait. How many to be seated?" Asked the lady at the counter.

"Seven." Dad answered.

The lady gathered the menus and led us to our table.

"We'll have a waiter with you shortly." She said and left shortly after.

"I see someone wanted somewhere 'high-up' for his birthday." Juyeon joked.

"This is a nice restaurant, Dad!" Cheered Naeun.

"Well I wanted somewhere nice to celebrate with my wonderful family." Dad smiled.

"Hi! I'm Jaehyun and I'll be your wai- (M/n! You didn't tell me you were gonna be here." Jaehyun said.

"(M/n), do you know him?" Mom asked me.

"Yeah, he's a friend." I lied.

I could see the smile on his face fade into one of defeat.

"Anyways, I'll be getting your drinks before I go on my lunch break." Jaehyun said and pulled out his notepad.

We each ordered our drinks and I couldn't even look Jaehyun in the eyes.

"I'll get your drinks out as soon as possible." He said before turning around.

"Wait, Jaehyun was it?" Dad called him down.

"Yes sir?" He responded.

"You said you were going on your lunch break soon. So why not join us?" Dad told Jaehyun.

"Are you sure?" Jae asked with a dumbfounded expression.

"Of course! Any friend of my kids is welcome." Dad cheered.

"Well thank you. I'll get your drinks and be right back." He said and hurriedly ran into the kitchen.

"Hey (M/n). Your friend's cute." Songyee whispered.

"Well he's off-limits." I whispered back.

She sat back and pouted and then continued to look over the menu.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jaehyun came back with our drinks and was out of his uniform in favor of a loose black shirt.

"Thank you again for welcoming me." He said as he took his seat next to me.

"Anytime Jaehyun." Mom said with a smile.

I felt Jaehyun's hand slowly attempt to intertwine our fingers underneath the table, but I swatted him away. He responded by looking at me with puppy eyes as I ignored him to straighten my posture.

"(M/n), why don't you ever invite Jaehyun over?" Mom asked me.

"I wonder the same thing." Jaehyun said under his breath.

I elbowed him in the ribs and then turned my attention back to my parents.

"He's usually busy with school or work, so there's never been a good time." I said.

My mom nodded as her attention was taken by the new waiter.

"Is everyone ready to order?" He asked.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The dinner was fun and lighthearted, except for me and Jaehyun.

He would try to make conversation with me, but I would simply ignore him or give simple answers.

I could tell he was getting frustrated by the way his grip on his cup was getting tighter, to the point where his knuckles were beginning to turn pale. The tip of his ears turned bright red, and for a second I thought I could see steam coming from his ears.

But somehow, he was still able to keep a smile and make conversation with my family.

I'm pretty sure they began to sense the tension as they would give us these looks of concern.

"I need to use the restroom." I said and left the table in a hurry. I knew he was following me based off the frustrated, heavy footsteps trailing behind me.

As soon as I entered the bathroom I was pinned against the wall.

"Jae! What are yo-!" I couldn't even finish my sentence before Jaehyun's lips met mine. I instinctively wrapped my legs around his waist and tangled my hands into his hair as he forced his tongue into my mouth.

"Why have you been ignoring me (M/n)?" He asked in a deep, husky tone.

I didn't answer him and instead tried to grind into him to give friction to my aching cock.

"Answer me." He growled and gripped my hips.

"Because I don't know what my dad would do if he knew I was with a guy!" I exclaimed.

He slowly trailed his hand to toy with my cock through my jeans.

"You could've just told me that instead of ignoring me. I felt hurt (M/n)." Jaehyun said as he moved his hand up and down in a slow rhythm.

"I'm sorry Jae-!" I whined when he slipped his hand inside of my pants.

We both kept quiet as Jaehyun continued to work on giving me a handjob. His movements getting progressively louder as more pre-cum leaked from my slit.

Without warning, he turned me around and pinned me against the wall.

"Such a bad boy for ignoring me. You deserve to be punished." Jaehyun whispered which sent chills down my spine.

He gave my ass a hard slap which caused me to yelp in pain.

"Shh! We're still in a public bathroom, remember? Unless you wanna be seen getting absolutely wrecked." He smirked as he lowered my pants and boxers to my knees.

"But you'd probably love that you fucking slut." He growled and spit on my hole.

"J-jae, isn't this your l-lunchbreak?" I asked.

"Don't worry baby. I already found what I want to eat." He inserted a finger into me as he continued to give me a handjob.

"Does that feel good?" Jaehyun asked after he inserted another finger.

I nodded furiously as I whined out an incoherent answer.

"Use words whore." He demanded.

"Y-you're so fu-fucking good, Jae." I moaned as he added a third finger.

"Good boy." He complemented and pulled out his fingers.

I whined in frustration to being empty and Jaehyun smirked at this.

"Calm down sweetheart. I'll get to the main course." He immeadiatly began to lick and kiss around and on my hole.

Jaehyun then slowly began to lick and bite before savagely eating me out my hole as if he had been starved for years.

I digged my fingers into the palm of my hand due to being overwhelmed by the pure ecstasy that is Jaehyun's tongue.

All throughout this, he never stopped giving me a handjob, and I could feel myself reaching my climax.

"Jaehyun~, I'm gon-na bust!" I moaned out.

"Cum baby." He said and then continued to ravage my hole with his tongue.

After a few seconds I came all over his hand and some even managed to land on the wall.

Jaehyun brought his hand to his mouth before licking up my cum.

He smeared the leftovers on my hole before licking it up.

He grabbed a few paper towels and cleaned up his hand, my dick, and the cum that landed on the wall. He pulled up my pants before I collapsed into his arms.

"We should get back to dinner." I said, but Jaehyun instead roughly placed me on the counter.

"We're not done here yet baby. We're not leaving until I cum. So be prepared to ride this dick like a pretty slut." He whispered into my ear.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"They've been gone for a while don't you think?" (M/n)'s mom commented.

Their food had arrived 30 minutes and they were prepared for dessert.

"Ju, go check on your younger brother." His dad said as Juyeon headed towards the bathroom.

He walked into the bathroom and was met with...

"Jae, faster, faster, fuck-!" (M/n) moaned.

"(M/n), you're so fucking tight! Take this cock like a good little slut!" Jaehyun growled to the boy pinned underneath him.

"Ahem!" Juyeon coughed.

Both boys looked in shock at the person standing in front of them.

"Am I interrupting something?"

[restapesta]

them playing truth or dare

Tami had been the one to suggest it.

Ian found it weird that everybody just went along, minds still sane and all, eager to comply and play as if they weren't all full-blown adults with marriages and children; but a few beers in—sans Lip who was sporting a Diet Coke—maybe it shouldn't have been that big of a surprise; the kids were otherwise occupied, Liam was at a sleepover, the Gallagher house was free for them, and them only.

Maybe Ian shouldn't have balked at his husband who had enthusiastically said yes! to playing truth or dare, as if they were all a bunch of teenage girls, begging for their crushes to be revealed. Ian watched Mickey from the corner of his eye as he took a shot of vodka that had been haphazardly lying on the table for communal use—great, Ian would be getting drunk Mick tonight. They'd probably have to crash at the house. Even Ian had a beer to drink and he got hammered pretty fucking quick.

"Okay," Tami said loudly, shushing the small crowd of people who were sitting all around the living room, speaking in a frenzy, voices mushing in together so it wasn't even conversation, just fucking loud and incoherent. Her hair was clinging wildly to her sweaty forehead, strands flying around as if electrocuted, and Ian realized this was the first time after her second pregnancy she was able to really get drunk. He applauded her for it, hoping she was having a great fucking time. Over a year of abstinence and he'd go fucking crazy, probably.

Ian couldn't help but guiltily look at his brother from the corner of his eye as if he'd been able to read his thoughts. He only looked away once Mickey elbowed him, whispering lowly how Ian should probably slow down with the drinks. Wouldn't want you to faint in ten fucking minutes and need me to drag you back home, said the man that was drunk off his ass.

Even inebriated he worried.

"Hey!" Tami shouted until all eyes went to her and the voices drowned out, dissipating into murmurs, one of them being Ian telling his husband that, it was so cute you're worrying about me, earning himself a middle finger in the face. She continued, seemingly pleased with herself for shutting a bunch of Gallaghers up, a feat not easily accomplished (what she didn't know was that everybody was still talking, just discreetly enough for her to not hear).

"Since I was the one who came up with the idea," She said proudly as if playing truth or dare was the smartest, coolest idea ever. "I think I should have the honors of starting."

Lip snorted beside her, a small smile playing on his lips. "You're drunk but okay." His head was shaved off completely, prompted by lice Fred had brought back home from day-care.

They were both sitting on two cushions on the floor, leaving Debbie on the sofa near the door, and Carl on the couch next to Ian and Mickey. His Coke can was so close to his leg, just begging to be spilled. Ian fought the urge to tell him to just move it to the side, but well, everybody else was practically drunk, so it didn't seem too fair. He was forced to endure a bunch of assholes while sober; the least they could do was offer him more Cokes and leave him to ruin his stomach in peace while they all ruined their livers.

"Shush!" Tami swatted at him, a concentrated look on her face. "We're playing."

Lip raised his hands in surrender just as Ian turned to whisper into Mickey's ear, "This is gonna be a shit show."

It was Mickey's turn to shush Ian, swatting him gently on the arm, focus solely on Tami and her upcoming question. He looked genuinely interested in what Tami had to ask—maybe he was looking forward to some juicy questions. Ian thought she'd be the one to ask the blandest ones.

"We're playing," Mickey said once Ian leaned in again to tell him just that, and Ian just shook his head lightly, biting his lip to stop from smiling.

Tami moved her eyes from her boyfriend all the way to Debbie who was fucking around on her phone, typing away slowly. Ian knew she was paying attention, but he also knew that her new girlfriend and their "relationship problems" probably exceeded the game right now.

"You ready, Debbie?" She asked, eyes dropping in sympathy. "This first one's for you. You said you needed to get your mind off of things."

Debbie lifted her eyes from her phone, eyebrows going up, biting her lip. She shut the screen off and crossed her legs, nodding to herself. "Shoot."

"Okay, so—"

"—What’s the most embarrassing thing that turns you on?"

Lip groaned along with Ian at the question. It didn't matter if they all knew everything and anything about each other's sex lives—Debbie talked about hers in a way that not even Ian and Mickey do. So Ian just squirmed in his seat, grimacing and then shooting a glare towards his husband who snickered at his facial expression, and they all sat and waited for their sister to start talking about sex as if they were begging to hear about it. Ian was mentally preparing for having his ears bleed.

"Hmm," She said. "Probably thighs."

They collectively blew out grateful breaths that she didn't feel the need to explain her answer. Ian still squirmed, because, well—why the fuck did he need to have that in common with his little sister?

"Carl," Debbie said, fiddling with her phone again. She probably got a new message she would need to send a ten-paragraph rant over. "What's the worst thing about sex, in your opinion?"

Ian eyed Carl beside him as he shrugged. "Not getting any."

It was Mickey who reached over Ian to clap him on the shoulder, grin wide on his face. He really was drunk. "Good answer, kid."

Ian turned to look at him, face scrunching in confusion. They literally had sex before they came over. "What are you talking about? You haven't spent a day in the past, like, four years not get any."

Mickey shrugged, sipping on his beer. "There were times I wasn't gettin' any."

Ian rolled his eyes. He knew Mickey inside, out—that man always got some, whether it be with Ian or without. So he asked, "When?"

Mickey looked at him, eyes clearer than before, still drunk but sober enough to answer Ian's question earnestly.

He cleared his throat, then sucked on his teeth when he saw Ian really was looking for an answer.

When the fuck did Mickey ever do celibacy shit?

"Look, man," He said. "sex," He annunciated the word. "isn't really the same when it's not with the person you want it to be with. It's weird and mechanical, and knowing what sex you could be having instead of the robotic fucking makes you hate it." He looked over at Carl. "I get what you mean by not getting any because I hadn't seen Ian for two fucking years before prison, and most of that time I just thought I'd have miserable, loveless sex for the rest of my life, so," He shrugged, again, settling back into the cushions. "Not getting any isn't just not having sex. It's not having sex with the only person you want to have sex with because you'll never see them again for the rest of your life."

"So," Lip started, a teasing air around his words. "Pointless fucking equals not getting any, and lovemaking with Ian here equals you bitches are soulmates?"

Mickey snorted. "Yeah, fuck you."

He then, probably noting how Ian was staring at him, completely flabbergasted, met Ian's eyes.

There was a second of them just staring at one another, Mickey's eyes quickly going up and down Ian's form in the most loving/sexual way, before he averted them to Carl again. "Come on, man, who's next?"

Carl grinned wickedly. "Ian,"

"Yeah?" He finally forced himself to stop staring at Mickey who was now placing his hand soothingly over his thigh, silently saying, You know what I meant. I know you know what I meant.

Carl's question was quick.

"Do you believe you and Mickey are soulmates?"

Ian's right eyebrow went up—he'd been practicing after a heated discussion with Mickey at three am on a Wednesday about who had better eyebrows. He was a sore loser.

"What kind of question is that?"

"Well," Carl said. "You've just broken up more number of times than I've had girlfriends—"

"We've always come back to each other," He interrupted, tone defensive; slightly frustrated. Mickey's hand squeezed, warm through the fabric of Ian's sweats.

"Yeah, but—"

"There's no question about it, Carl. If there's anybody in this world that's literally meant for me, it's Mickey. I've loved him since the very first day I met him, and I'll love him until the day I die." He meant it with every bone in his body and he just wished somebody would put it in question again, after all they had been through. Wasn't that proof fucking enough that if there's anybody in this world Ian loves more than Mickey, it's Mickey loving Ian back?

"That answer' your question?" He asked, chin jutting out.

His hands went up in surrender as he lowly whistled. "Got it, chief."

"Yeah, Ian," Tami said, eyes rolling animatedly. "We get it—you love each other most in the world, blah, blah, barf."

Mickey choked out a laugh. "Come on, Red," He said, looking again towards Ian, gaze soft. "Next question."

So they played on.

[reidsconverse]

New Years Eve • Matthew Gray Gubler

MGG X Fem!Reader

Warnings: matthews a dick, reader forgives too easily. (angst)

Based on this request | word count: 1.9K

A/N: this is an old post i had on here before i deleted all my works. i think it fits the request quite well but i have tweaked it. (just in case it looks familiar to anyone)

"Hey babe, are you ready?" You called out to Matthew, who was lounging in the living room, scrolling through his phone. It was new years eve, and the two of you were getting ready to go out and meet your friends at some bar downtown.

You heard Matthew huff before getting up from the couch and walking over to you, "Why do we have to go again?" He asked, shoving his phone into his pocket.

"Because..." You said, opening the door to see if the taxi you'd ordered was outside, "...Our friends invited us out and we haven't seen them in a while so it's only fair we go. now stop pouting and let's go, the cars here." You began walking to the car and he followed behind you, mumbling something incoherent.

The journey was unusually quiet. You weren't sure what was wrong with Matthew, but he seemed to be in a bad mood which had shifted your vibe as well. "Hey, are you ok?" You asked him. You just wanted him to cheer up and enjoy new years with everyone.

"It's nothing, I'm fine don't worry." He replied, giving you a half-smile and a look that told you that probing further would be pointless. The two of you reached the club soon after, entering quickly after the bouncer had recognised Matthew. Sometimes dating a famous actor had its perks.

You were greeted with a cheer, "Hey guys." you said, the both of you taking a seat at the booth the group had rented out. You looked down at the table, noticing an array of colourful glasses and bottles. "`Ooo drinks!"

"A whiskey for the gentleman and a margarita for the lady," Paget said, handing you the drinks she'd ordered for you, which you happily accepted. The conversation was flowing well, everyone exchanging stories of what they'd been up to in the few months they'd been apart.

"So...." Your friend began to speak. She'd noticed that Matthew wasn't interacting with the group, so she directed her next question towards him. "How's filming going, Gube?"

Matthew didn't seem too enthusiastic to answer, but he did anyway. "It's good." His glum tone made you sigh. What had him in such a bad mood today?

As though AJ could sense your mood deflating, she quickly asked you a question. "Do you wanna go and dance?" She suggested. For a second, you turned to Matthew, about to ask if he wanted to join you. But he was on his phone again, the same sullen look was on his face, so you just looked back at AJ and nodded.

You guys danced for a while, the DJ playing some classic throwbacks. It was fun, you'd missed hanging out with them, and you were glad you weren't letting Matthew ruin your evening. Eventually, AJ ventured off to find her husband, leaving you to dance on your own, and you decided it was time to ask Matthew if he wanted to dance. It was weird to see him glued to his phone. His whole life motto was to stay from screens and live in the moment.

You walked back towards the booth and sat next to him. "Babe, come down, and dance with me please?" You had your best puppy dog eyes on, the ones that always worked. Except for today... he looked at you for a moment before rolling his eyes.

"I'm not in the mood, you'll be fine by yourself." He said, dismissing you and going back to his phone. You were speechless. It was one thing to say no... you wouldn't have been upset at that, but the way he had brushed you off left you feeling unsettled, almost embarrassed.

You wordlessly walked back to the dance floor, deciding to push the conversation out of your mind and just go back to enjoying yourself. After a few songs, you forgot about Matthew, simply losing yourself in the music. As you closed your eyes, you felt a pair of hands grab onto your waist. You assumed it was your boyfriend, so you whispered, "Nice of you to finally join me," as you began to dance against him. His hands ran up and down your body, and you let it happen, pressing yourself closer to him. That was until you felt someone pull at your arm; you opened your eyes to see Matthew seething as he dragged you from the dancefloor. You could feel people around you staring as you tried to release his grip on you, murmurs started to float around the room, and you felt yourself sobering up quicker than you would've liked for this situation.

You only realised what had happened once you were halfway out of the club, the cold air hitting you as the blood rushed to your cheeks. You couldn't believe you had just done that...you had just danced with another man right in front of your boyfriend.

"M-Matthew I-." You started, not even sure what to say. It was an honest mistake, but you still felt foolish for it.

"Save it." He interrupted, stopping a cab before opening the door for you to get in. "We'll talk about it when we get home." He didn't say a word to you the entire trip back. You hated the silence. It gave you room to think. You sat there looking out the window, your thoughts rushing through your brain, dreading the argument you knew was coming.

The car stopped far sooner than you would've liked. You took a deep breath before getting out of the cab, following Matthew back into the house. "What the fuck was that?" He said, his voice cutting through the tense air the minute the two of you walked through the door.

"Matthew, it was a mistake ok? I thought he was you and I regretted it the minute I realised he wasn't." You explained, taking your shoes off and placing your coat on the hook.

"Bullshit." He yelled, the sound making you jump. You and Matthew had argued many times; it was normal...healthy. But never, in any of those fights, had he yelled at you. You barely had time to process what he'd done before he continued. "You looked like you were enjoying dancing like a slut."

Your jaw dropped at this, not entirely believing what was happening. "What did you just say to me?" Your voice was laced with shock.

"You fucking heard me Y/N." His tone was vicious. He rolled his eyes as he walked over to the fridge, taking out a beer.

"Fuck you," You whispered; your voice was shaky as you tried your best not to cry. "I don't know what's got you in such a bad mood but you don't get to fucking talk to me that way. Especially when I fucking said I made a mistake and apologised."

You couldn't stop the tears from falling as hurt took over your body. You sunk down onto the ground, knees pressed against your chest as you continued to sob. Matthew looked at you for a minute, his eyes softening at what he saw.... you, completely broken. Perhaps it was the sight of you with tears in your eyes, your whole body shaking with disbelief, or maybe it was just him coming to his senses again. Whatever it was, it made him realise how awful he'd been.

"Fuck...I didn't mean that, any of that. I-I'm sorry." He said, kneeling down and attempting to wrap his arms around your trembling body. But you moved away from him before he could do it; you couldn't get over what he had said so quick.

At the beginning of your relationship, you'd dealt with his fans calling you everything from a slutty bitch to a gold-digging whore. It was always an insecurity that one day Matthew would listen to them and leave you. You'd attempted to move past the comments, listening to Matthew when he said that those people didn't know you or your relationship, that their words were irrelevant... insignificant. But that's why hearing him call you a slut hurt so much; it brought back the insecurity, the fear that you had.

"You might not have meant it, but you can't take back what you said." You sniffled, wrapping your arms around yourself for comfort.

"I've been a complete dick. I know that and I'm sorry." His eyes looked straight into yours, full of sincerity. He lets out a defeated sigh before continuing, "I've...I've just been arguing with my team all day. They want me to leave on Friday and I'm telling them that's not possible but they're not taking no for an answer. I just got back, I can't leave you again."

You subconsciously moved closer to him, your arms leaving your side and reaching up to hold his face. You felt weak; you were weak. You hated how easy it was to crumble and forgive him. But you couldn't stop yourself. Sure, he had fucked up but so had you and now, with his explanation, you understood why he was angry. You just wish he had spoken to you about it.

"Promise me you'll never say anything like that again and that you'll tell me when something's bothering you." You said as he lifted his head to look into your eyes again. His hands placed themselves over yours.

"I promise... I am so fucking sorry." His voice was full of regret. "I love you so much, and I'm so fucking sorry for what I said. It was cruel and unfair to lash out at you."

You nodded, and despite the tiny part of you that wanted to stay mad and not give in so quickly, you gave him a small smile as if to say you accepted his apology. Your eyes casually scanned the room, landing on the clock above you. You gasped lightly as you realised the time. It was 11:58. In all the drama, you'd completely forgot about why you'd even gone out in the first place. You pulled away from him slowly, standing back up as you held out your hand to him, lifting him up before speaking, "Let's go outside." He nodded and followed you out.

The two of you were silent as you stood out on the balcony. You could hear people getting ready to celebrate; the sound of cheers and chattering surrounded you both. You smiled to yourself, realising how grateful you were that you had Matthew regardless of how difficult things could be. Because at the end of the day: after the fights were over...harsh words said for the sole purpose of regretting them later, you knew you could always count on him to love you unconditionally. To you, moments like this, where you're in his arms, feeling nothing but content and safe, outweighed all the moments that are not so great.

You were taken from your thoughts by him nudging you, pointing to his watch to show you the countdown was going to begin. You could hear people on the streets chanting and whooping, the general feeling of excitement making you giddy.

3...

2...

1...

He gave you a small smile, pulling you closer to kiss you. a kiss that was different to the others, a kiss that told you he was yours and his heart belonged to you, and no one could change how he felt. And as you both stood there embraced in each other's arms, listening to the fireworks go off, you both smiled at each other.

"Happy new year." He whispered.

And somehow, deep down, you knew that it would be.

[ererokii]

This is my first request so I hope I do it right. I was wondering if you could do something with Todoroki and/or Tamaki with Y/N always pinning after them but after awhile they give up and the boy(s) notice and don’t like the absence of them. Like, you decide if they always liked them and they just didn’t know how to act around them or they realized they liked them now that their gone. @corallilac0101102 

I tried a different format this time! And I like it so i might be using this one a lot more often. Sorry for the wait lovely! I hope you like it! unedited, sorry if its not the best

He’s too shy to even notice the attempts you made to know him better.

He can barely talk to you without having to meet the wall for the fifth time that day. 

When you pair up with him for a group project, you are so happy. Words couldn’t express the emotions you were feeling. You gained a crush on the indigo haired boy in your second year but whenever you talked to him, he would flee.

But in your third year, you weren’t having it. And with this project, it ensured that you can actually talk to him. 

You knew he was quiet, but you expected him to make an effort for small talk. By all means you would have never spoken to him if he was going to be like this. 

After a while of him shunning you by turning his back to you to pretend to do something else, was starting to get to you. You couldn’t even get a small hello from him. If you were being honest, he was hurting your feelings with no ill intention. He never showed any emotion to you once so ever.

Were you that horrible? Were you annoying?

Did he not like you? 

☽✧ ✦ ✧☾ 

Tamaki expected you to talk to him once again. He loved listening to your voice. He thinks it’s soothing and can calm his nerves. The only problem for him; he can’t talk back to you without getting nervous. He enjoys seeing how animated your hands are when you speak about something you’re passionate about. But because of how happy you are when talking to him, he can’t return the same energy back until the feeling of nausea ever goes away. 

His eyes trail on your sluggish figure as you walk to your seat beside him. He stayed silent as normal, waiting for your cheerful greeting. But nothing came. He eyed you from his peripheral vision, a sad feeling dwelling in his body at your sadden look. What happened?

“We should get started now. We’re almost done and I want to finish this,” you finally spoke up after a quiet moment, pulling things out of your backpack. An underlying of anger and sadness could be heard in your tone. A brush of your shoulder against his sent chills up his arms. He didn’t expect you to be so quiet.

The duration of class was a nightmare. He hated the awkwardness between you. Why couldn’t you just speak to him? Or at least, why couldn’t he speak to you?

Small pants left Tamaki’s mouth as he quickly followed you down the corridor. “Y-Y/N!” he watched as your body halted, looking over your shoulder. He noticed a look of hurt in your eyes. “What was that back there..?”

“What do you mean? I was just tired. Seems that you don’t like talking to me anyway.”

His heart ached as he shook his head, approaching you. “N-No course that’s not it! I love being around you! You just make me so nervous that I don’t know how to act!”

“Then why does it seem like I bother you? You always shun me away or you never acknowledge me. Don’t worry. I got your message.”

“No it’s not like that! I really like you and you make me nervous!”

Those few words were enough to make changes in your relationship. And since then, he made an effort to talk to you, even though it pained him to do so. If it meant seeing your smile again, he would do it.

Oh Todoroki notices you, he for sure does. He’s very observant. He notices the way you greet him first thing in the morning, you walk with him to lunch and you’re always walking to class with him. 

At first he wonders why you want to befriend him. I mean why? He was socially awkward and dense. Very dense. 

And Todoroki is blunt, he says it how it is.

When you ask him a bunch of questions to try to get to know him, he thinks it’s pointless. And he would rather not talk about his personal things. He thinks it’s weird to tell someone his favorite color, if he even has one.

There were points where your presence just became too much for him. He slowly gets aggravated when you continue your actions. His tone is more snappish. He’s losing his patience. But he feels terrible, because he knows you only meant well. 

But he can’t help but snap at you one day when your questions become a little too personal.

 ☽✧ ✦ ✧☾

Many times his heart ached when he saw you with Kirishima or even Bakugou. He couldn’t blame anyone else besides himself. He only feels this upset when his eyes lay on his father, someone he didn’t want to affiliate himself with. But by the looks of it, both of them fail in maintaining relationships. 

He could go for someone asking him thousands of useless questions. Todoroki feels lonely as he awaits for you to come back, but you don’t. 

The son of the Pro Hero watches as you walk right past him in the hallway. A small incoherent noise leaves his mouth as he follows you from behind, reaching out for your arm, “H-Hey YL/N!” 

You just wanted him to leave you alone already. You got his message, so why was he bugging you now?

“Look, Todoroki, I know. You don’t have to tell me twice. I’m leaving you alone, for good.”

A groan is heard as he shakes his head, trying his best to plead with you. “No that’s not what I meant. I meant-”

“You didn’t mean it in a rude way. Don’t worry, it’s okay. I’m okay now. Really.”

“I’m not used to it!” he blurts out suddenly, eyes wide from his outburst, seeing your startled expression. He sighs quietly as he grabs both of your hands in his warm ones, staring into your eyes. “What I meant to say, was that I’m not used to it. At all. I never had someone try to know me. So when you asked me those questions, I got overwhelmed. It was never my intention to belittle you like that.”

You stayed silent, choosing to look for an answer in his eyes. “Are you serious?” you ask quietly, averting your gaze from him after a few seconds of intense eye contact. 

“Yes, I am.”

“..you goddamn idiot. You could have just told me from the start!!”

He defends himself once more as you laugh away, the thick air that was between you, was now gone. Honestly, if he was upfront with you, this whole ordeal wouldn’t exist.

[miraculouscontent]

Always.

“Truth” is just... I mean, I want to say “garbage” but that doesn’t even do how bad it is justice? Like, okay, I take four major issues with it (my followers be like: just four? :P):

First is the writing in general and the continuity of it all. This episode looks like it’s been through multiple drafts and the final product is an amalgamation of a bunch of them with no coherency between any of them. I already could kind of guess it from the Adrimi kiss that the finale removed, but it’s obvious that there were going to be Adrimi/Lukanette arcs in Season 4 but then stuff happened (i.e: the staff being cowards) and they got cut. It’s totally possible that the plot with Jagged Stone being the father and Marinette having to keep secrets from Luka were still the same episode even in the original draft, but I imagine it at least wasn’t episode one.

There are other, more subtle hints as well, like the episode giving no time to Luka learning that Jagged is his father (making the fandom wonder if Luka remembered when he was Truth) and Ladybug being shocked when she realizes that the akuma is Luka as if she didn’t already see him be akumatized. Juleka also gets weirdly sidelined in the episode despite being Luka’s twin (Astruc has stated that both Luka and Juleka are older and Juleka got held back, which is why she’s in Marinette’s grade but Luka isn’t), so she’s Jagged’s offspring as well. One might presume that Juleka just never cared at all but that doesn’t mean she shouldn’t be allowed to interact directly with the guy or have any involvement at all. All it would’ve taken is for Luka to mention that Juleka never cared about who their father was but he did, thereby implying that Juleka’s reaction to Jagged would probably be more like, “oh okay.”

You know, if they didn’t reduce her to incoherent mumbling.

Second is the timing of this episode. We had the New York special with Paris being destroyed, but it’s clearly fine here (so I guess it isn’t canon now; thank God honestly), and while it’s technically possible that enough time has passed (supported by the vague implication that Marinette having to miss out on dates with Luka has gone on for a while, given Tom and Sabine’s lack of reaction to them dating), it’s not supported by Marinette examining the Miracle Box as if she’s only just gotten it.

There’s also Shadow Moth, where we’re shown an extended version of the scene from the end of “Miracle Queen” where Gabriel repairs the peacock miraculous, giving the episode a “Volpina”->”The Collector” vibe but then why are the events lining up the way they do???

The narrative also does a really bad job at showing us why Marinette is so strapped for time. She has guardian duties now but you’d think it’d balance out with her not having to go to Fu anymore for guardian training (you know, that thing we never saw but was said to be happening or at least that it was Fu’s intent to have it happen). You could argue that maybe Shadow Moth is more active, but then Chat Noir should be affected by this too; Ladybug states outright that she’s been busy and Chat Noir responds with something akin to, “oh I know, because you’re guardian,” which implies that it’s her guardian duties keeping her busy and Shadow Moth is just interrupting her dates specifically.

But we don’t even see what responsibilities she has added on as guardian. I knew the writers would make it so her being guardian was a hassle, but it’s the first episode of the series and we’ve gotten next to no answers for what being guardian actually adds.

It’s almost like this was a rushed first episode to break up the only thing that unambiguously made Marinette happy for the sake of bringing the love square back and needlessly making her suffer because the writers think it’s hilarious.

Speaking of which, the third thing thing is the comedy because--just--I hate the comedy in this show.

Like, just to start, there’s the kwami, who clearly begin with their mob mentality from the later episode of “Furious Fu” and all proceed to act like children. No, I didn’t expect them to all be wise (I mean, Xuppu exists and is very much not that, having been implied to be a fit for Kim who is known for being a total himbo), but I don’t expect them to all scatter like they do. Kaalki in particular, who was shown to be more poised and refined, blatantly reveals herself to a bunch of civilians just for the sake of Marinette freaking out and needing to make up an excuse.

Same with Alya and her friends. Marinette is panicking because of the kwami and Alya “deduces” (while shading Marinette so blatantly that it’s insulting) that Adrien must be there in her house which--maybe don’t SAY THAT OUT LOUD in case Adrien is literally in her room???). Then Marinette gets a call from Luka, shouts his name, and the girls do a complete 180 in support of Lukentte. It’s not like I’m not for them supporting whatever Marinette wants to do, but the shift is so sudden (and contradicts “Frozer”) that it gave me whiplash and the entire scene ends up being pointless since the girls still go with the “Marinette is in love with Adrien” thing when Truth asks them what Marinette’s secret is. Like, we could’ve gotten small, stupid secrets that everyone thought only they knew about Marinette, but instead it’s just the same thing over and over again (which makes no sense since, by the time Alya blabs the secret - which Alya has already told Nino before anyway - it’s no longer a secret therefore making the answer invalid).

Heck, the whole “secret” thing could’ve even been the people Truth shoots finding ways of answering his questions in a way that is technically telling the truth but also not really, such as if Anarka had answered the, “Who’s my father?” question with, “someone you know/someone famous,” so as to avoid saying that it’s Jagged Stone. It’s just boring seeing characters answer with whatever the asker wants to hear instead of being able to find a way around it.

And then there’s Chat Noir, who’s just--ugh.

Like--okay, I’m going to be extremely petty for a moment and just go off because I hate Chat Noir’s role in this entire episode. The Season 3 finale went out of its way to have Chat Noir be all like, “I have a girlfriend,” when it was a lie, and then Season 4 just parkours around Ladybug telling him that she’s dating (Ladybug clearly took no issue with Chat Noir telling her he’s dating so it’s not like she’s worried about issues there; she’s gotten on his case before in episodes like “Startrain” so there are exceptions) because they want to keep having him flirt and not be sAd because this is Marinette’s episode of suffering and Chat Noir actually having to face the reality that Ladybug is dating (not just in love with someone else) would’ve actually been interesting. Chat Noir gets tons of unnecessary screentime in the episode - mostly for the show to shove in LadyNoir shipping fuel - and then actively avoids telling him the obvious thing because he would’ve actually been forced to grow/develop/stop flirting.

It would’ve been so cute and sweet to see him awkwardly trying to flirt without overstepping boundaries (so more like banter than flirt) or - you know - actually try to support Ladybug and want her to be able to finish her dates by him offering to keep akuma/sentimonsters busy, but no, he’s just left in the dark.

The finale had Chat Noir supporting her (terribly but I digress) and then doesn’t do anything with it at the start of Season 4, meaning his support of her was completely meaningless and just there.

His first appearance is him pranking Ladybug when she’s already overstressed and busy, which comes off as super poor taste and I’m both glad he got splatted into that window for it but also upset because it’s screentime completely gone to waste, and of course it’s just a lead up to him guilting her by being like, “nooo the only thing that hurts me is when you leave me alone during patrol!”

I know he’s teasing (...probably) but it leaves a bad taste in my mouth because we know (well, I knew because I know how this show works) that Luka and Marinette were going to break up because of Marinette’s hectic schedule, so it just comes off as insensitive to joke about it, especially when Ladybug’s busy guardian status just serves as a reminder that Fu is gone.

Even when he’s protecting Ladybug from Truth’s questions by cutting in and asking a question of his own, of course he asks about himself to forcibly fish compliments out of Ladybug because she can’t lie to him, and of course they have Ladybug compliment his humor most of all as if that trait hasn’t nearly gotten them in danger multiple times and she’s been repeatedly annoyed when he decides to joke during the worst possible times. It’s as if the writers wanted to pat themselves on the back for their own comedy, so they had Ladybug be a mouthpiece to stroke Chat Noir’s ego.

He claims he won’t force a truth out of her and then literally forces her to say what her favorite things about him are. I acknowledge that this can be seen as me nitpicking but we went from the finale where Chat Noir actually stepped up and took charge (because Ladybug was stressed but I guess him doing anything useful is just whenever it serves the plot) to this where he’s back to flirting constantly and jamming in as much LadyNoir shipping fuel as physically possible. It’s not that he’s useless but he’s annoying and takes up space in an episode that’s supposed to be about Luka and Marinette.

And that leads us into the fourth thing, which is the break-up and just the treatment of Luka and Marinette in general. I could go on and on about how the Season 3 finale built up their relationship just to tear it down in the first episode of Season 4, but that’s not the main issue here.

Luka brought Marinette comfort. He made her happy. He never judged her. He was happy to just date her regardless of any conflicted feelings she might have because hey, who is he to complain if she wants to give him a try and who knows what’ll happen?

And the season couldn’t even give one moment of them being unambiguously happy without ruining or interrupting it. I was ready for the break-up and I was even ready for it to be the first episode but I wasn’t ready for it to be so bad.

Marinette’s Adrien pictures appear out of nowhere (again, makes no sense for the timeline) when they’ve been gone for basically all of Season 3 and even “The Puppeteer 2″ specifically which makes a direct reference to “Troublemaker,” the episode that purposefully overdid it with her pictures (”Truth” has more hanging up and clearly used “Troublemaker” as a reference, by the way). They’re just there for force the love square and Adrien into the episode as much as possible to remind the audience that Adrien breathes. There is literally no purpose to any mention of Adrien and bringing him up isn’t even relevant to Marinette and Luka’s break-up.

It’s just upsetting to know that the umbrella scene from “Origins” (which is already flawed in and of itself) kickstarts this whole thing. Adrien did basically nothing there except for clear up a misunderstanding and give Marinette an umbrella when his ride was a few meters away and Marinette’s house was just across the street, but that actives Marinette’s absolutely crippling crush on him that lasts for 3-4 seasons. Marinette is in this eternal struggle of not being allowed to grow and change because the writers think her stammering/crushing on Adrien is funny while actively punishing her for having this crush in the first place (again, like in the scene with Alya, which insults Marinette for her crush when she wasn’t even panicking over her crush).

It’s the same with Luka, and I can’t believe that it took me until this episode to realize that he and Marinette are both treated the same way: tormented by episodes for having a crush on someone. Episodes will go out of their way to forcibly insert Adrien into the plot to both humiliate Marinette and make Luka feel awkward when the episode isn’t supposed to be about Adrien at all. “Truth” is just “Desperada 2.0″ except Adrien is barely on screen at all and they still felt the need to name drop him constantly. The writers are so sensitive to the idea of people jumping onto another ship or forgetting that Adrien exists that they’ll find any possible way to include him.

“Silencer” knew better. “Silencer” knew that Marinette’s life didn’t have to revolve around the mere mention of Adrien’s name and that she had other interests/desires/traits outside of him. Adrien isn’t brought up once and it was great because the show didn’t feel the need (for once) to throw Adrien into an episode that he had nothing to do with.

Even if I was a love square shipper, I would feel insulted by “Truth” because one half of my ship kept getting name dropped and used as a tool to humiliate the other half, which makes it all the more eyeroll-worthy when the love square stans of the fandom praise this episode for breaking Lukanette up when--oh, wait, they didn’t even break up “because Adrien.”

And that ends up being the real thing here. The writers had to invent a reason for Marinette and Luka to break up. We already know that Jagged Stone being Luka’s dad is a retcon (not technically in the show’s canon but in information we heard about outside of it), so they shoved in Luka having issues about not knowing his father specifically so that he would be pushed over the edge when Marinette couldn’t tell him about her being Ladybug.

When Luka and Marinette were just together and hanging out, Adrien wasn’t mentioned once. Say whatever about the Adrien pictures being on the wall and Marinette’s stammering (she always says stupid stuff when she panics - especially stuff she doesn’t mean - so I’m not upset with her so much as the writing for having her mess up in that specific way), but the only time Marinette talks about Adrien at all in the episode is when someone else brings him up.

She goes on a date with Luka to the cinema and they were having a great time without Adrien involved at all. I know I already stressed this point in a previous post, but one of the reasons that I find Lukanette to be so amazing is because the show actually focuses on Marinette’s interests and doesn’t force her to be the writer’s mouthpiece for gushing about their sunshine boy a punching bag for comedy. In every Lukanette scene that doesn’t bring up Adrien/before Adrien shows up, Marinette is either praised, able to be happy, or is showing one of her interests that isn’t aDrIeN, and whereas Adrien being on-screen around Marinette usually just means that she’s gushing about/stammering around him with no development, Lukanette features us actually learning more about Luka or other characters.

“Captain Hardrock” - lets her bond with Luka over a shared interest in Jagged Stone, and Luka is established as a sort of empath who uses music as a way to speak for himself

“Frozer” - gets to practice ice skating with Luka, who is actually good at ice skating and also can tie laces despite not tying his own because he’s a rebel

“Desperada” - gets to try out guitar with Luka and we learn that Luka has been playing guitar for as long as he can remember

“Silencer” - showcases Marinette’s interest in fashion and properly introduces Kitty Section; has a plot featuring all of them together doing something not even remotely love-related and we get actual confirmation of Luka’s crush on Marinette, along with Marinette’s reaction (blushy+happy; just saying, idk how anyone could watch “Silencer” and not think that Marinette was crushing on Luka)

“Heart Hunter” - Marinette gets a song written for/about her and Luka is established to have a job

“Truth” - brings up Lukanette’s shared interest in Jagged Stone, features Marinette’s interest in fashion when she gives him a gift she made + had Jagged Stone sign, and shows her raising her voice but not being judged by Luka for it, who’s happy with her just the way he is

When the show focuses on Lukanette, it’s all about lifting Marinette up, praising her, and making her feel good. When Adrien is involved or it’s hyper-fixating on Marinette’s crush on him, it’s about bringing her down and making her feel bad for a crush they keep forcing her to hold onto and humiliating her for.

Point being, the writers had to force their way into getting Lukanette broken up because of their precious love square and the fact that Marinette and Luka being happy is the opposite of what they want.

It’s embarrassing to watch a team full of old white guys (I’m convinced at this point that they just hang their female writer on a coat hanger so they can point to her whenever someone says that their staff is too male-dominated) treat their female biracial lead with such disrespect, and I can only presume that the mistreatment of Luka is because he’s supportive of her and they don’t like that, meaning that the way she’s treated ends up rubbing off on him.

It doesn’t come off as a fun or interesting plot; it comes off as cruel. When Adrien is sad, he usually gets people rushing to comfort him (”Party Crasher,” “Gamer”), but “Truth” has Marinette in tears over the fact that she can’t have a boyfriend due to being Ladybug and the writing has the gall to crack jokes about Kaalki not knowing what tears are, and then Marinette has to ask for the kwami to hug her for comfort.

When Luka gets akumatized into Truth, the episode doesn’t even hesitate at bashing away at him, from everyone saying that Marinette’s secret is that she “loves Adrien” (which, as Truth points out, isn’t a secret, and they could’ve had this somehow lead up to a twist ending where Marinette actually isn’t into Adrien anymore and the Adrien pictures were genuinely for reference, but she stammered about it because it was embarrassing that her boyfriend got sent it with no context) to one of Luka’s favorite songs actually being about how Jagged abandoned him to go on tour. Luka has to deal with Marinette ditching him constantly (not that I blame her) and not knowing who his father is despite wanting to know, and the episode treats him like trash for... what? Having a crush on a girl who’s secretly Ladybug? Because that’s all it seems to come down to in the end.

I also have serious gripes with the fact that Marinette has this huge schedule established in “Gamer 2.0″ and they don’t even try to explain why she can’t use it to keep track of her obligations. The episode has her say (in a roundabout way but still) that she’s forgetting stuff constantly because of all of her emergencies (the emergencies of which are not stated and I hate the subtle implication that forgetting something means you don’t care about it when that’s clearly not how things work and also not what Marinette comes off as because - again - they establish that she’s overworked) but fails to properly explain it. The episode hammers away at Marinette having all these issues and even has Tikki chide Marinette by asking her about leaving Luka alone while apparently neglecting the fact that Marinette HAS to go be Ladybug right now and what else is there to even do??

Both Luka and Marinette are punished for just having a crush and wanting to be together and I hate that the episode forces a break-up instead of coming up with a solution to the problem. Instead of “Marinette isn’t ready for a romantic relationship,” it feels more like she’s just not allowed to be happy.

Long-distance relationships are a thing. Relationships where people don’t get to go on dates frequently are a thing. Instead of forcing a break-up, the episode could’ve had a lesson/development where Marinette is told that she’s allowed to pursue a relationship and just needs to plan accordingly. but they just didn’t want to.

For example: instead of planning dates, Marinette could wait until an akuma/sentimonster is defeated to call Luka and ask him out, because Hawk Moth usually doesn’t strike immediately after one is dealt with. I’m positive that Luka would happily take impromptu/sudden dates over planned-but-inconsclusive ones. Heck, they don’t even have to date specifically and can just stick to phone calls (kwami can’t be picked up on technology) or hanging out in Marinette’s room/on Marinette’s balcony while they do their thing.

Relationships are a commitment, but that doesn’t mean they have to be a burden, and the episode absolutely drags Marinette over it. The whole thing with the kwami being released and stressing her out when they’re not supposed to be able to just come out normally is explained away by, “oh, the new box must be like you, Marinette; full of surprises!” when the reality is just that the show wants to take away everything that’s sacred to Marinette. The Season 3 finale had Fu’s letter telling Marinette that “life doesn’t always give you what you want, but the real gift is life itself,” then proceeds to turn Marinette’s life into a living hell.

Her room? She has to say good-bye to her privacy because now the kwami are always going to be around. The first thing one of them (Trixx) did was start reading her diary, showing that they have absolutely no shame or regard for Marinette’s feelings.

Her schedule? Conveniently pops away into the realm of non-existence so she can look bad for ditching Chat Noir on patrol and neglecting dates with Luka due to her responsibilities/stress.

Her boyfriend, the one person in the entire show who loved her, respected her agency, never judged her, actually apologized when he made her sad, and who she was genuinely in love with rather than just having the equivalent of a celebrity crush for? She had to break up with him because plot and needing to force her to go back to fawning over the guy who has only made her life worse by her crushing on him.

When I say the universe hates Marinette, this is what I mean. It created random akuma to attack Paris all for the sake of forcing Marinette away from Luka, and apparently didn’t realize what they were doing in the scene where Marinette hurries back to the Liberty when Kitty Section and Adrien are playing together when Adrien is Chat Noir so he should’ve been late too.

(Oh, and Marinette completely ignores Adrien in favor of waving at Luka and even tells Luka outright that Adrien isn’t even a factor in their relationship issues, further proving the “multiple drafts smashed together” and “the Adrien name drops are pointless” points.)

The whole thing in “Backwarder” where it was basically outright stated that Marianne could’ve been Fu’s confidant had Marianne not been outed by Ladybug’s mistake? Completely forgotten and left to the wayside. Marinette could’ve told Luka that she was watching the Miracle Box in Ladybug’s place (for any number of reasons, really: either Ladybug thinks it’s too dangerous to keep with her, or if the public doesn’t know that Ladybug is guardian, then Marinette can just say that she’s guardian) and that she has to run off to keep guard of the Miracle Box when an akuma/sentimonster happens in case Ladybug needs a miraculous.

Boom, done, episode solved. Luka gets to help Marinette with the kwami, Marinette is less stressed because someone knows half of her secret, and Luka and Marinette continue to date but are able to plan around akuma attacks.

But no. That whole thing in “Backwarder” where guardians (or at least Fu) can have a confidant was just there so Marinette could feel guilty about screwing it all up, because she’s not able to take advantage of that perk herself.

How convenient.